Touching The Void
by madascheese
Summary: Sort of one-shot based around season 2 episode 'Dear Boy' detailing Angel's perspective of the first and last time he sees Darla in this particular episode. Rated T just to be safe.


**DISCLAIMER: **Unfortunately, I do not own Angel or any of it's associated characters, though I would wager that my life would have turned out a lot more interesting if I did… ;) I'm just borrowing the characters etc for a while, no harm done (promise!!).

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I walk tonight through the City of Angels as it's champion, a warrior for good, though the devil feels restless inside me, as always. The scent of that thick, heady night air fills me as I breathe deeply, inhaling the smell of the world gladly, though it's a breath I need not take. A sense of pride, and some small remnant of contentment, fills me for a fleeting moment as the people of the city walk by, safe in their ignorance of this creature walking among them; the pale-skinned man with the long black coat meandering his way through a world so distant that it appears almost like a vague dream underneath the stars.

It's been years since I've wandered so casually through the night alone, and yet reminders of my purpose in this place, a city masquerading as a haven for all that glitters, plague me with the knowledge of what I really am. I latch on, naturally, to an even stronger scent, accompanied by a sense of familiarity that I can't quite place as I walk through a street stinking of the bowels of the city, but I can't let this go – there's something there that throws me back to a time when I watched the world evolve around me with interest whilst devising ways to destroy it; a time when thoughts of pure hedonism, borne out of relentless cruelty, filled my mind. Memories of villages burned down to the ground, of convents, noblewomen and maids swim before me, and I find part of myself longing for the simplicity of a life without conscience, though disgust kicks in to wake me from my careless reminiscing. Never again.

The one single possibility dawns on me, and she's there, in front of me, for the first time in years – my sire, the woman who promised to show me the world and who cut her way through it, the vampire I staked for the love of a slayer; my eternal obsession. She walks casually down the street parallel to mine, a little ahead of me as her blonde hair shimmers through the warm night air, irresistible waves of her scent drifting seductively towards me – she turns to face me, glancing momentarily, and walks faster when I notice her. The fact that I recognise her seems to fill her with a mixture of terror and anticipation, as if she half-expected me to turn around and walk away, but I can't. I still remember, and something of my old self stirs, receding as she disappears. Darla.

Time seems insignificant as I hunt her down, determined to satisfy myself with the knowledge that I'm right, that my old flame has been given new life, and it feels as though only moments have passed before I have her to myself in that vast, empty chamber, peeling away her facade with a strange kind of pleasure to reveal the woman I never knew, trapped inside the head of a four hundred year old vampire, confused and yet impossibly excited all at once.

Me? I'm enjoying the sensation of her back in my arms, the whimper that escapes her lips as I shove her against a stone column, her blood thudding ever faster against my lifeless skin. All nobility is forgotten in an instant as I truly reveal myself to her, feeling her excitement pulse through me with the fierce tenacity I remember so well as her chest heaves almost hypnotically, contrasting her natural stillness I became accustomed to in our many years together. The beast inside of me roars as her blood screams, pounding like a thousand beating drums in this theatre of echoes, the stage upon which history should surely repeat itself, though this time she would finally be mine. The beast begs for her to scream and fill this dead air with intoxicating fear, for her to push me over the edge where I would be beyond rescue, detached from my tortured self and stripped of all humanity.

She doesn't, and I crash back down to Earth as the fallen Angel, the vampire with a second chance. I watch her run into the sunlight and marvel at just how much it glitters as it sweeps across her perfect skin, touching the pale pinkness of her lips and those slender shoulders without incident, a sight so alien to me that it seems completely unreal. She walks away, ascending into the light and to the world above as I retreat to the dank, stinking sewers below the waking world, my head swimming with guilt and, still, unfulfilled desire as I reflect on her, the new Darla, taunting me with her presence just beyond my reach.

Some people bring out the worst in you, but her? She brings out the monster, the reality of everything I fight to atone for; but deep down, passion rules us all.


End file.
